As is customary, Diamondbacks Manager Kirk Gibson and Williams met with the umpires at home plate before the game and exchanged lineup cards. After shaking hands with Williams, Gibson began booking it toward the dugout.

“We used to run five, six days a week together,” Gibson said of Williams. “Run distance, run ramps, run stairs. Matt, he’s got good lungs, a lot younger lungs than me, so if you go distance, if I can hang in there to the end I could always out-kick him. So he knew by the end of when we’d run, he’d always have to go out hard and try to lose me, get a good lead so he could beat me.

“So last night I told him how I had that knee surgery, I don’t know, five weeks ago or something like that, so I’ve been telling him how bad my knee is, I can’t run, I can’t do this. So he said ‘let’s go on a big run.’ So he’s all set up, and I just shook his hand. He didn’t know anything was going on. I just sprinted off there. It was a setup. Is that cheating or is that just smart?”

That’s cheating, Kirk.

Scott Allen writes about all things D.C. sports. Follow him on Twitter @ScottSAllen or e-mail him if you’ve got a tip to share.

Comments our editors find particularly useful or relevant are displayed in Top Comments, as are comments by users with these badges: . Replies to those posts appear here, as well as posts by staff writers.

To pause and restart automatic updates, click "Live" or "Paused". If paused, you'll be notified of the number of additional comments that have come in.

Comments our editors find particularly useful or relevant are displayed in Top Comments, as are comments by users with these badges: . Replies to those posts appear here, as well as posts by staff writers.